"Not with all these witnesses. Let's check in with Smith."
Remo was about to start off when the cabbie demanded his fare.
"Here's our share," said Remo, handing over a twenty.
"I'll need the other one's share, too."
Remo looked around. "Where'd she go?"
"Took off."
"How about that, Chiun? Tammy stiffed us for cab fare."
"We will have our revenge on her and all of her blood," Chiun vowed.
"Not over a twenty," said Remo, handing over another bill.
At a pay phone, Remo checked in with Harold Smith. "Smitty, he's still up on the train-station roof."
"I know. I am monitoring the situation."
"It looks like a parade route here. And that's not counting the FBI, police and media. Any suggestions?"
"According to early reports, the terrorist escaped through the rear exit of the South Postal Annex to the train terminal. From there, he was pursued to the roof."
"Ever hear of the FBI Violent Postal Worker Task Force?"
"Are you making this up?"
"I hear they're trying to talk him down." "They will fail. They are dealing with a hardened terrorist, not a disgruntled postal worker."
"We go in with all these TV cameras, and we'll be all over the evening news."
"Try the rear route."
"Why not?" said Remo, hanging up.
Skirting Summer Street, they slipped to the South Postal Annex, which was still open but deserted except for a solitary mail clerk. Bypassing the lobby, they walked to the rear of the building. A short path took them to the Amtrak platforms at the rear of South Station.
They scrutinized the blank back end of South Station. Except for a few police officers preoccupied with listening to their shoulder radios, the field was clear.
"Looks like we're in luck," Remo said. "I see a couple of blind spots we can climb."
Chiun looked at his jade nail protector and made a face.
"Can you climb with that thing on?" asked Remo.
"Of course," Chiun said, his voice unconvincing.
"Maybe you should stick it in your pocket so you don't lose it."
"I have no pocket."
"Let's go, then."
Moving to a place where the rude sandstone came all the way to the ground, they started their ascent.
Remo went first. Laying his hands against the rough-textured blocks, he made his palms into shallow suction cups. Then, moving one hand up, he got a toehold. The toe pushed him along. And his other hand suctioned a higher spot on the facade. After that, he was a silent spider moving vertically.
Chiun, following, used his fingernails to gain purchase, assisted by the toes of his sandals. He quickly came even with Remo. Then, in a flutter of plum- colored skirts, he pulled ahead.
"This isn't a race," hissed Remo, noticing that the Master of Sinanju had crooked the nail protector against his palm to keep it safe.
"Then you will not mind losing," Chiun retorted.
They gained the coping at the same time, slithered over and crouched down so they wouldn't be spotted by the rattling helicopters overhead.
A pair of local news helicopters orbited at a much wider periphery, obviously under orders not to venture into sniper range.
Across the roof, a mailman hunkered down behind the spread-winged sandstone eagle, an Uzi cradled in one hand.
"Stay away!" he shouted at the crowd below. "I am disgruntled. I am feeling very disgruntled today. There is no telling what I am capable of in my present state of disgruntledness."
Chiun whispered, "Did you hear that, Remo? He is disgruntled."
"He's going to be a lot worse after we're done with him," Remo growled, starting forward.
They moved like two shadows, avoiding the searchlights of the hovering police choppers, pausing, resuming, backtracking until they were almost on their quarry.
Mohamet Ali could not believe his evil luck.
He had been sorting mail in his hideous pink cubicle when the two Westerners with bad ties and stone faces came and announced their intentions.
"Mr. Mohamet Ali?" asked one.
"Yes. That is I."
"FBI. We need to speak to you."
Mohamet Ali froze inside. Outwardly he kept his composure. After all, these were not Muslims, but dull Westerners. It would be easy to outwit such stone- headed ones.
"I am speaking to you," he said.
"You'll have to accompany us to headquarters."
"I am very busy here. Can this not wait until I am finished for the day? The mail must go through. Do you not know this?"
"Now," said the senior of the two FBI agents.
"I must get permission from my supervisor. They are very strict about such things here."
"It's been cleared. Let's go, Mr. Ah."
They were taking no nonsense. So, containing his nervousness, Mohamet Ali shrugged and said, "If I must go with you, I must go with you—although I do not not why."
"We'll talk about it downtown."
On the way to the front exit, they walked on either side of him. They did not handcuff him. That was a mistake. For as they approached the exit, Mohamet Ali took his USPS-issue pepper spray from his pocket and turned on the man behind him.
One squirt, and the infidel's godless eyes were stung blind.
The other FBI unbeliever spun in time to accept the bitter taste of defeat in his face, as well.
Mohamet Ali left them shouting and cursing their unjust God as he returned to his work area, took up his Uzi from his locker and ran out the back door- right into the train platform as people were boarding.
His machine pistol was not noticed at first. But his blue sweater with the blue eagle of the USPS was immediately recognized.
The first people he encountered shrank back. A woman screamed. Someone yelled, "Look out, another one's gone postal!"
That was enough to start a panic.
Mohamet Ali found himself caught in a frantic boil of people, all running in different directions, including unwittingly at him.
Like a man who faces a herd of charging elephants, Mohamet Ali lifted his Uzi and triggered a stuttering skyward burst.
"Back! Back away, I tell you!"
That changed the direction of the human herd. People leaped into the empty train track bed and hunkered down.
Mohamet Ali fled into the great concourse of South Station—right into the approaching police officers.
"Stay back!" he cried. "I am disgruntled. I am very disgruntled!"
The police came to a halt, hands on service pistols.
One made calming gestures with his empty hands. "Stay cool, buddy. We won't hurt you. Just lay down your weapon. Okay?"
"I am feeling very disgruntled today. I will not lay down my weapon for any of you."
All shrank from his fearsome words.
"Look, we don't want this to get any worse than it already is."
"Then let me pass. The mail must go through. You cannot impede me, for there are laws against such things. Have you never heard of the crime of interferrag with the mail? It is federal. A federal crime— which is the worst of all."
"Gone nuts for sure," one of the policemen muttered.
"Let's talk about this. My name's Bob. What's yours?"
"Mohamet Ali."
One of the policemen thought this was humorous, and to be taken seriously meant survival if not escape, so, Mohamet Ali set the Uzi to single shot and shot him dead.
The surviving police took him very seriously after that. They tried to kill him, in fact.
Mohamet Ali threw himself behind the big glass newsstand. Firing wildly over his shoulder, he made his way to a door.
The police wanted to shoot him but did not want to shoot other people. So their shots were infrequent and futile.
Mohamet Ali ran upstairs, downstairs and everywhere he ran, he found that there were U.S. police agents blocking his path of escape. From thei
r expressions, they were very frightened of him.
Somehow he found his way to the roof of South Station, where he could command all approaches.
Hours later, with night falling, Mohamet Ali still commanded his destiny—but escape was out of the question. The intersection below was filled to overflowing with infidels of all kinds.
His only hope lay in rescue. If not, then he would martyr himself in some spectacular way designed to bring great credit to the Warriors of Allah, which was the name of his jihad cell.
The trouble was, he could think of no suitable fashion to enter the gates of Paradise, and he possessed but one clip of bullets, now half-spent.
Meanwhile the criminal FBI down below kept trying to talk him down while news reporters shouted exhortations and entreaties from a distance.
"What do you want, Mr. Ah?"
"I wish to escape, fool. Is that not obvious?"
"Why do you want to escape? What do you want to escape from? Is it the pressure?"
"Yes, yes. The pressure of fools such as you."
"Talk to me about the pressure, Mohamet. What is it that's made you unhappy. Can you articulate it?"
"No, I cannot. It is unspeakable!"
"Nothing is so bad it can't be talked about. Come on, fella. Let it all come spilling out. You'll feel better."
Mohamet Ali considered these words. And angling the Uzi around the great decorative stone eagle, shot the fool dead.
After that, they did not try to talk him down. They pulled back and attempted to wait him out.
Infidels began calling for him to jump to his doom. It was a thought. But because infidels desired it, he would refuse their enticing entreaties.
At the hour when Mohamet Ah realized his best option was to suck on the erupting barrel of his own Uzi, his weapon was forcibly extracted from his hands.
Ah was stuck in his crouch, trying to keep his legs from going numb. He heard no approaching footsteps, felt no shadow, but his Uzi jumped from his hands.
Ali's gaze followed his weapon, and he saw a tall man with the shadow-hollowed eyes that made him look like a death's-head.
"Are you crazy!" he hissed. "I am a crazed mailman! Such a one as I am is very, very dangerous."
"Cut the crap. You're only a terrorist. Time to cough up."
And the Westerner gave the captured Uzi a squeeze. The gun actually complained as it twisted up. Then it fell to the roof, clearly maimed by the experience.
"That which you just did was impossible," Mohamet muttered.
"That which I am about to do will hurt very deeply."
"I fear no pain, not even death."
A different voice said, "You will learn fear, then, Muhammadan."
And Ali felt pain such as he had never known. The source seemed to be in the vicinity of his ear. It was very acute, as if the ear were being ripped away with exceeding slowness.
Ali screamed. And screamed some more.
The pain subsided to a dull achiness, and his tearing eyes sought out the source.
An Asian man. A little mummy of a man, impossibly old.
"Who are you, mummia?"
"Your doom," intoned the mummy whose eyes glowed in the waxing moonlight. He had the lobe of Mohamet's right ear pinned between his thumb and some sinister green implement of torture capping his forefinger.
"I will tell you nothing," Mohamet said bravely.
"You will divulge the name of him who commands you."
"Never!"
Then the sharp green torture tool pinched more deeply, and the pain returned. Not only to his ear, but to his shoulder and the back of his neck. It was like electricity. Ali understood that Westerners believed the human body to be electric. He had never accepted this heresy until now. Now his entire body felt like a jerking puppet of sparks and short circuits. Very painful ones.
Ali attempted to beseech Allah to help him withstand the wicked agony. But Allah did not hear him. He heard the words coming from his own mouth as if from far away.
"The Deaf Mullah! I serve the Deaf Mullah!"
"Nice try. The Deaf Mullah's in the federal pen. Better coax him harder, Chiun."
The pain became exquisite.
"The Deaf Mullah! By Allah, it is the Deaf Mullah who commands me!"
"Better let me try, Chiun. I think you're off your game."
"I am not. This man cannot resist me."
"He's telling lies."
"No, I swear by the Prophet's beard. No lies. I am a servant of the Deaf Mullah."
Then the hard steel fingers dug into his shoulder. Where the other dispensed electric pain, this one gave bone-breaking agony.
"The Deaf Mullah, by all that is holy! The Deaf Mullah! How can I say it that you will believe me?" Mohamet blubbered painfully.
The two withdrew, hovering some feet away in the dark. Ali could hear their urgent whisperings.
"He's telling the truth," said the tall Westerner with the death's-head face.
"I told you this, but you did not believe me," squeaked the ancient mummy.
"Maybe the Deaf Mullah's getting messages out of the pen."
"This is possible."
Then they returned, two grim moon shadows.
"What's the game plan?" asked the Westerner.
"To visit terror, shed infidel blood and create other anti-Western mischiefs," Mohamet grudgingly admitted. "So that the infidel nation collapses, and the pure flame of Islam flowers in the scorched soil of idolatry. It is really for your own good, for you are truly Muslims under your infidel skins."
"What was your part supposed to be?"
"When I was told, I was to blow things up."
"What things?"
"Whatever things I was told."
"What were you told?"
"I was not told! What manner of terrorist would I be if I fell into enemy hands and told of my missions?"
"A valuable one," said the mummy Asian.
That sunk in.
"Then I am not valuable?'' asked Mohamet.
"Not to us," said the Westerner.
"You are going to kill me?"
"Nope. You're going to commit suicide."
"I wish to die. I admit this. Paradise calls to me. But I have no intention of committing suicide unless in doing so I can take infidels with me. That is not my mission. I am a suicide mailman, not a fool."
"Maybe you're both."
"I do not see how."
Then the Westerner picked him up bodily and tossed him over the spread-winged eagle.
Mohamet Ali saw the pavement come rushing up to meet him, and his last conscious thought before his head pulped against hard Western concrete was, I am too young to die.
Remo and Chiun left the roof by the back way and melted into the surging crowds.
"This may be easier than we thought," Remo was saying. "We know where the Deaf Mullah is. All we have to do is take him out."
"Smith's missions are never simple," Chiun said.
"This one will be."
"You wish."
They were moving back to the heart of the commotion at the corner of Atlantic Avenue and Summer Street. As the police pushed back the crowd to clear the way, an ambulance came scooting up Atlantic.
"What is the hurry?" asked Chiun. "He is dead."
"I think they want to scoop him up so the cameras can't telecast every drop of blood."
"What kind of cretins enjoy the sight of blood?"
"People who don't have to deal with it every day like you and me," Remo growled.
Chiun nodded, his hazel eyes roving. Abruptly they narrowed. A hiss escaped his papery lips.
Remo spotted Tamayo Tanaka almost as quickly. She was standing before a mobile microwave TV van,
a Channel 4 microphone floating before her sensual red lips.
Her crisp words floated to their ears, thanks to their ability to filter out unwanted sounds and focus on the important.
"...unimpeachable information that the United States
Postal Service has been infiltrated by Muslim terrorists bent on global domination, wholesale rapine and pillage and deeds even more unwholesome."
She touched her earphone connection to listen to the on-air anchor.
"Yes, Muslim terrorists. Not militia, as reported elsewhere. Nor a breakaway faction of the postal union."
Remo said to Chiun, "Nice going, Little Father. She's starting a panic."
"It is not my fault," Chiun said stiffly.
Over at the remote truck, Tamayo Tanaka said, "Back to you, Janice," and flipped her mike to a sound man, who had to tackle it so it didn't break on hard pavement.
She was touching up her makeup when Remo and Chiun suddenly appeared on either side of her.
"I thought you needed at least three sources to go on the air with something like that?" Remo demanded.
Tamayo didn't even look up from her compact mirror. "Well, you're two of them."
"Not on the record."
"And I'm the third," she added. "My numbers are good, which translates as automatic credibility."
"What if we're all wrong?" demanded Remo.
"Then a weekend anchor gives a fifteen-second retraction, and all the important careers go on. Are my eyes on straight?"
"One is drooping," Chiun said.
"Which one?"
"Figure it out," said Remo. "By the way, you owe us a twenty for the cab ride."
"It was my cab. You hijacked it. Be thankful I didn't kick you out."
"You know, you remind me of Cheeta Ching."
Tamayo grinned broadly. "She's my hero. I'm going to be the next her."
"The last her was pretty hard to take."
"Fly to any city in the country, and you'll find at least one Asian anchor, all competing to take Cheeta Ching's place in the constellation that is network news. And I just took a major step up the golden ladder."
She pressed her lips together, thought them too red and reached over to take the sound man by the sleeve of his white shirt. The sound man was busy coiling up the mike line and didn't notice he'd been hijacked until Tamayo delicately dabbed her mouth with his sleeve.
"Just right," she said, returning the arm. "Too red, and I look like a Ginza hooker on the make."
"Go with the feeling," said Remo. "Come on, Little Father."
From South Station, it was a straight subway run to Quincy, so they filtered through the emergency- services people and grabbed a Red Line train.
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